To think that improving state schools needs people to pay an e.g. a state school tax?

Have I missed something? Will private schools be legally obliged to pass in the tax liability to parents? Surely they could choose to suck some or all of it up themselves?

But that's a completely different scenario. If someone can't afford private school, their child can go to state school (I appreciate it may not be ideal for many reasons, but it exists as an option for the majority). A quarter of children in the UK live in low income households. So many families wouldn't be able to afford any extra costs and may withdraw their child and then it's the child that suffers.

I'm not anti private schools btw. I went to one, and we may send our DDs to one for secondary school but that's not for a few years.

As for OP's comment that anyone who "uses" state schools should pay - we all use the education that state schools provide. We all benefit from children being properly educated.

How does that work? We buy uniforms, pay the school and then don’t get uniforms! I don’t understand

Absolutely this

🤣🤣🤣

No, it's not reasonable. People already pay tax for this very purpose. Paying more tax will not improve state schools or the NHS because money needs to be funneled to exactly where it is needed and there needs to be a long term plan, just as there was in other countries who recognised their education was lacking, considered what they wanted/needed and implemented long-term change (e.g. what does the country need in the next 50 years and how do we achieve it? Is it a more digitally savvy workforce because we lack other options? Ok, how do we do that? We need to teach IT skills in school and support existing companies offering tech jobs and attract start-ups and tech talent from elsewhere etc). Britain has wasted time and money over and over again analysing how to replicate successful education plans from other nations. They know what they need to do to improve. They just always fail to actually take action. It's not a question of money.

Very true! Admissions reform could make such a huge difference.

There is a gross lack of funding in state schools. There are however some things that could be achieved with little monetary cost. Those parents who do not parent could parent and schools could work together with parents to improve discipline which in turn would help with learning too. Might have a positive effect on retention too.

What about electric cars?

Plus for many schools catchment is not the priority for the entry criteria.

Vehicle Excise Duty registers a car as legal on the public highways; road fuel tax, plus VAT, is a duty on the miles driven/fuel economy. The alternative is a road pricing infrastructure, probably using the existing ANPR camera network, which covers most A roads.

Loads of other tax sources that aren't income tax - VAT is one of the more progressive ones and a 1% increase in VAT raises more than increasing the basic and higher rates of income tax by 1p each - and it's generally more progressive.

The other big money spinner is employer NICs.

If you wanted to raise more, rather than borrowing or reprioritising, there are options within the existing system even if you didn't shift to new sources.

However given the current state of public services, low comparative pay and the overall economic picture, there is a reasonable case for one-off borrowing to deal with structural issues in some cases.

Not really, as the way vehicle tax works means some pay nothing for their car. I only pay £20 myself, that's not going to fill many potholes.

Source: The Conservative Party, everywhere this week. It's how they're saying they'll pay for their election giveaways. Unfortunately this money wasn't available for the pandemic catch up programme for children...

'Agreed. Where dues the money come from to do all that?'

There is only one source that can raise enough to materially impact the services provided to 10 million children, and that is general taxation. PAYE.

The top 10% already pay 60% of income tax, so it has to come from more general taxation, ie everyone.

Anything else will make a marginal difference at best or no difference at all. Which means either raising PAYE or reprioritising how we spend the money already raised.

You asked about ways of improving state schools without throwing money at the problem, OP. Well, job one is to solve the recruitment and retention crisis.

Firstly, do something drastic about teacher workload. The best solution would be to give teachers less contact time, but you can't do that without employing more teachers to cover the shortfall. Not doable without more money, and impossible anyway atm as there simply aren't enough people who want to be teachers, even with a big bursary to train).

So... put schools back into LEA control, ditch Ofsted, get rid of league tables, ban written homework in KS3, set national guidelines for much stricter behaviour management (SLT to routinely remove troublemakers from lessons and supervise them) and stop deterring schools from excluding students, set a national limit of 2 data collection points per year (except public exam years).

Make schools stop making teachers accountable for things beyond their control. Place some of the expectation back on students (who currently know their teachers are more stressed about the results than they are). Stop expecting teachers to do lunch time interventions for students who cba to pay attention in class time.

Also, total ban on prescriptive uniform rules. Only generic e.g. navy trousers/skirt, white shirt etc. Allow trainers and whatever coloured socks. Basically stop making petty rules which waste teachers' time and piss off students. Ideally ditch uniform altogether. And I'm just getting started.

pedantic

There is no such thing as road tax

But it goes to families quite high up the income scale. Would we not be better directing that money where it is most needed?

Child benefit could be subsidising the big mortgages for wealthier families in exclusive catchment areas that are keeping poorer kids out of the best state schools. That doesn’t make sense to me. It could also be buying expensive trainers, tennis lessons and foreign holidays. Why should some kids have that while others can’t even have their EHCPs fulfilled or otherwise access a decent education.

@Theyhadsomehoneyandplentyofmoney Have you got any useful suggestions on how to improve the state education system apart from your poorly thought through 'pay more tax' idea? Or was your intention just to start a goady thread.

By that logic, there’s no reason that multi millionaires can use the state system without paying a penny more in tax.

I think that the problems with a lot of state schools run far deeper than a lack of funding. Some of the best performing schools have less funding than others. Anecdotally, our local schools with the best facilities (state of the art sports facilities, recording studios etc) have the worst outcomes for children.

However, if we want meaningful increases in state school funding, it’s going to take more than the VAT on school fees which is optimistically estimated to raise 1% of the state education budget. A 1% increase in income tax, VAT, or means testing state education would raise multiples of the amount predicted from VAT on school fees.

£60 billion for primary and secondary schools.

I just think more people need to work to increase our tax revenue 🤷🏼‍♀️ rather than furthering the burden on working people

And your point is? That's your choice. if you choose to pay for private schools fees there's no reason for them to be tax-exempt.